[Duncan]

I have a standard Type 2 to Type 1 cable for untethered chargers.

However, I am finding a new hurdle emerging in public charging. Today I tried to a 7kw free public charging bay (paid for by a local council) and to my annoyance it was a tethered and Type 2.

Just tried searching for a converter but the ones I found have male/female the wrong way round: not sure who those are targeted at?

In either case, has anyone seen the converter that I would need to plug-in my car with a Type 1 socket?

Was there not an untethered charger as well? For example, the chargers the council has installed across Oxfordshire are mostly type 2 tethered but there's at least one untethered unit at each site as well.

 

[Duncan]

Tethered type 2: completely unusable by very roughly 70,000 EVs with Type 1 connectors (that's in the UK).
Socket: less convenient for the majority, perhaps very difficult for some disabled drivers.

Socketed type 2 are also completely unusable by an unknown number of plug-in drivers who don't have a type 2 cable.

The Oxfordshire scheme, installing mostly tethered chargers in council car parks is intended to benefit people who live close by with no options for off-street parking with their own chargers. A lot of those people will be buying their cars second hand rather than new so they won't necessarily have their own cable even when one was included with the new car. Older EVs and some PHEVs may not even have come with a cable when new and even when they did how many will be passed on when the car is sold?

And I don't know how accurate is your 70,000, but that would make it just about 6% of all plug-in drivers so they probably reckon a site with 10% socketed will cover it.

Usability among disabled drivers is a very valid discussion point for a public benefit such as a free charger, but disabled drivers tend to need bigger bays with more freedom of movement so until corrected I will suspect the problem resolves itself when all factors are taken into account.

Again with the Oxfordshire scheme, all those tethered chargers have wider than usual spaces with a cross-hatched area down at least one side of the space.

 

[Duncan]

You are bluffing! I know of no car that cannot use a Type 2 socket: Even a Scottish Aviation Scamp or Enfield 8000 (240v 50Hz 13A for 8 hours) could be plugged-in to a type 2 socket (by changing the plug or adding an adapter). The only unknown is the number of British citizenry who are unable to source or use a cable (of any kind).


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No, I'm simply saying that many people with plug-in hybrids don't have a type 2 cable at all. That means they cannot use socketed chargers without the expense of buying a cable and why would they do that when they can just plug in to some rapid with an AC cable and trickle charge at 3.6kW? So giving them access to slower tethered AC chargers makes a lot of sense and benefits everyone.

 

[Duncan]

How do they plug-in without a cable?

Maybe they use the granny cable that came with the car, or perhaps they have a tethered charger at home.
If you have a PHEV and mostly charge at home then paying £100 for occasional use of public chargers doesn't make much sense.

Untrue because tethering the AC charger blocks that charger for a lot people, and thus is clearly not a benefit to everyone!

They've also blocked a load of parking spaces from use by the 80%? of Oxfordshire drivers that don't have a plugin car. I don't think there's any intention to benefit everyone.

The tradeoff is that by making it unusable for 6% of plug-in drivers you make it more convenient for everyone else and accessible to people who can't use untethered at all (including those with mobility issues where tethered is significantly easier to use).

That 6% is only going to drop in future, there will be no new plugins that can't use the tethered chargers. The Oxfordshire council chargers are looking to the future: they are intended to make it possible for people to buy an EV when they have no option to charge at home. They're looking to benefit people who currently don't have an EV but could get one in future.